


Feel

by Haeronwen



Series: AELDWS 2015 [2]
Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: Drabble, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-19
Updated: 2015-11-19
Packaged: 2018-05-02 10:14:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 291
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5244545
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Haeronwen/pseuds/Haeronwen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Eames teaches Arthur how to forge.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Feel

**Author's Note:**

> Written for AELDWS, for the prompt "body swap". Many thanks to kenopsia for looking over this for me!

“It’s not imitation,” says Eames.  “Don’t ever make the mistake of thinking that it’s as simple as imitation.  We are not mimics.  We have more subtlety than that.”

“Then,” says Arthur, with perhaps more bite than is entirely warranted, “ _what is it_?”

“It’s art, darling.  It’s a thousand brush strokes on a canvas that make up a person, all the layers and the imperfections—they’re not things you see, they’re things you _feel_.”

Sometimes Arthur wonders if Eames listens to himself when he talks.  Other times he _knows_ he doesn’t.

Evidently the consternation shows, because Eames makes a valiant attempt at patience that mostly comes off patronising, and says, “Why don’t we try this again?”

Abruptly, Arthur is pissed.  Pissed, and tired, and _determined_ , now, to prove himself and to prove Eames wrong—a familiar urge.  He takes a breath and closes his eyes and thinks about lines of shoulders and terrible shirts and crooked smiles, and also about chewed pens and uneaten olives and soft vowels.  The kind of easy, loping grace born of money and of shapely limbs but also of determination (never to let them see you bleed).

Arthur opens his eyes, defiant, only for Eames to look at him with something indescribable in his expression that Arthur thinks now might always have been there.  Eames says, “ _Darling_ ,” like it’s a revelation, and maybe it is, because when Arthur turns towards the mirror he doesn’t see himself.  He sees _Eames_.

Arthur smiles a hesitant, crooked smile, clad in his terrible, terrible shirt, and it’s as if something falls suddenly into place.  “Things you _feel_ ,” he says, weighing the words in his mouth.

There is a beat, then Eames smiles dazzlingly—dimples full force—and reaches for his hand.


End file.
